Felting needle



March 7, 1967 E. P. FOSTER 3,307,238

' FELTING NEEDLE Filed March 5, 1965 United States Patent The presentinvention relates to improvements in felting needles.

It is common practice in the art today to provide felting needles withone or more spurs in the body portions thereof and in which portions ofthe spurs for engaging fibers to be interlaced comprise intersectingsurfaces presenting a sharp edge or flat fiber engaging surfaces boundedby sharp corner edges, These known felting needles in the pastfunctioned reasonably satisfactorily but with the development of highspeed needle looms these known forms of felting needles causeundesirable cutting or breaking of fibers, and further in most instancesthe recesses at the spurs are unsatisfactory in providing sufficientaccess of fibers to the spurs for efficient operation of the needlelooms.

Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide afelting needle with one or more spurs which have fiber engaging surfacesfor interlacing fibers with little or no cutting or breaking of thefibers.

- A further object is to provide a felting needle as last noted in whicha recess for the spur provides for ready access of fibers to the spurrendering the felting needle efficient for use in high speed needlelooms.

The above and other objects and advantages of my invention will appearfrom the following detail description of a preferred embodiment of myinvention.

Now in order to acquaint those skilled in the art with the manner ofconstructing and utilizing felting needles in accordance with thepresent invention, I shall describe below in connection with theaccompanying drawings certain preferred embodiments of the invention.

In the drawings.

FIGURE 1 is an elevational view of one form of felting needle of mypresent invention fabricated as described herein below;

FIGURE 2 is a greatly enlarged perspective view of a portion of the bodyof the needle of FIGURE 1 showing the improved spur of the presentinvention.

FIGURE 3 is a side elevational view illustrating the manner in which aspur in accordance with the present invention is struck into the bodyportion of the felting needle;

FIGURE 4 is a detail sectional view taken substantially on the line 4-4of FIGURE 3 looking in a direction indicated by the arrows;

FIGURE 5 is a plan view of a portion of the body of a felting needle andshowing the improved spur of the present invention;

FIGURE 6 is a side elevational view showing the manner in which thekick-up of the spur shown in FIGURE 5 may be controlled;

FIGURE 7 is a detail cross-sectional view taken along the line 77 at theleading edge of the die shown in FIGURE 3 looking in the directionindicated by the arrows; and

FIGURE 8 is a detail cross-sectional view taken along the line 88 at thebase edge of the die shown in FIG- URE 3 looking in the directionindicated by the arrows.

Referring now to FIGURES 1 and 2 of the drawing, I have shown a feltingneedle 5 constructed in accordance with my invention which comprises abody portion 6 and a shank portion 7. The lower end of the body portion6 is pointed as at 8 to facilitate penetration of fibrous material to becompacted in a known and conventional manner. The upper end portion ofthe needle may be bent substantially at right angles to the shankportion 7 to pro- 3,307,238 Patented Mar. 7, 1967 vide a securingelement or ear 9 for clamping between a base member and a clampingmember of a conventional needle plate. As is well known, such a needleplate is adapted to support a plurality of felting needles, such asshown in FIGURE 1, which in reciprocation of the plate in the feltingmachine effects the interlacing and compacting of loose fibrousmaterials.

It is preferable in practicing my present invention to provide a feltingneedle having a salient angled body portion, that is a body portionhaving intersecting surfaces providing an edge, such as shown at 10, inFIG- URE 2 of sufficient longitudinal extent for a spur 11 andassociated recess 12. Typically for such purpose the body portion 6 maybe of polygonal cross section such as of conventional triangular crosssection currently employed in the art and as illustrated in thefragmentary portion of the body 6 of the needle shown in FIGURE 2. Abody portion of triangular cross-section provides three edges at whichspurs may be formed and in practicing my invention a single spur andrecess may be formed in one or more such edges or a plurality of spursmay be provided in the edges as desired.

As shown in FIGURE 2, a portion of the material of the body of theneedle in the corner edge 10 is displaced to form the recess 12 and suchdisplaced material shaped into a barb 11 above the recess.

Referring now to FIGURE 3 the recess 12 and the spur 11 are formed inthe edge 10 by a spur forming tool 14 having a leading edge 16 and abase edge 17. A concave groove 18 extends inwardly from and lengthwiseof the leading edge 16 of the tool. A concave groove 21 extends inwardlyof and lengthwise of base edge 17. The tool 14 may, by way of example,be applied to edge 10 of the body of the needle in the directionindicated by the arrow 19 and along the line 20 at an angle of 45 to theedge of the body portion and in a lengthwise direction of the body awayfrom the pointed end theerof. The leading edge 16 of the tool 14 may,again by way of example, extend at an angle of 20 to a lineperpendicular to the edge 10 of the body. Application of tool 14 in themanner described displaces material in edge 10 diagonally inwardly andlaterally of the body 6 in forming the spur 11 and recess 12. The groove18 of tool 14 as best seen in FIGURE 7 is defined by side walls 22-22converging toward each other from opposite sides of the tool and attheir inner ends are joined by a curved end wall 23. The mouth of thegroove 18 is preferably slightly wider than the width of edge 10 of thebody portion. The groove 21 is defined by a smooth concave surface 24.The surfaces of the grooves 18 and 21 are preferably highly polishedserving to provide the material or fiber engaging surface of spur 11with a like surface.

In the application of tool 14 tothe edge 10 of the body of the feltingneedle, in the manner above described, the spur 11 is formed to extendlaterally outwardly of the body portion with a fiber or materialengaging surface projecting downwardly or toward the pointed end of theneedle. The spur 11 is defined by downwardly converging lateral sidesurfaces 25-25 formed by the sides 2222 of tool 14 and joined by aconvex material engaging surface 26 conforming to the concave surface 23of the tool 14. In applying the tool 14 to the edge 10 of the needlebody, a greater portion of the material is displaced lengthwise of theneedle body away from the pointed end thereof and a lesser portioninwardly and laterally outwardly at the inner end of the recess 12 sothat the inner end of the recess is slightly wider than the width ofedge 10.

In the foregoing application of tool 14 to the edge 10 of the body ofthe needle it will be seen that the recess 12 is defined by a bottomwall 27 of convex configuration transversely of the body of the needleformed by groove 21 of tool 14- having a first convex surface portion 28extending diagonally inwardly and upwardly or toward the spur, andsecond convex surface portions 29'29 lying laterally outwardly of theside walls 25 of the spur 11 to provide a throat, indicated generally at30, extending obliquely from the side walls of the spur around the bodyof the needle. Also, as viewed in FIGURE 3, the spur 11 has an outwardlyprojecting surface 33 lying laterally outwardly of the surface of edgeof the body of the needle. If desired, the outer end of the surface 33of spur 11 may be engaged by a flattening die, such as shown at 35 inFIGURE 6, to control the kick-up desired for the spur of the needle, andimpart an arcuate configuration to the covex material engaging surface26 as best seen in FIGURE 6.

Referring now to FIGURE 2 there is shown in a single fiber 40 and by therelationship of the fiber with respect to the recess 12 and spur 11 ofthe felting needle in the operation of the latter in interlacing fibers.It will be seen that the fiber 40 lies in the throat 30 and extendsaround the convex working surface 26 of the spur and obliquely aroundthe body of the needle. This relationship is important in that assuming,for example, should one end of the fiber 40 be anchored and the otherend free, the fiber in downward movement of the needle in interlacingdirection may freely slide or move on the material engaging surface 26thus avoiding cutting or breaking of the fiber. Further, the throat 30provides for greater access of fibers to the spur.

A significant structural feature of the present invention is in theprovision of a material or fiber engaging surface, such as at 26,connecting the laterally inwardly and downwardly projecting surfaces 25of the spur to eliminate any shearing or chopping effect of the spur inengaging and interlacing fibers. A further structural feature resides inthe spur and recess being defined by rounded surfaces offering littlefiber resistance for interlacing the fibers smoothly and withoutturbulence.

While I have shown and described what I consider to be a preferredembodiment of the felting needle of the present invention, it will beunderstood that various modifications may be made therein withoutdeparting from the spirit and scope of the invention.

I claim:

1. As a new article of manufacture, a felting needle comprising a bodyportion and a spur having a convex material engaging surface at itslower end formed be: tween downwardly converging lateral surfaces of thespur.

2. As a new article of manufacture, a felting needle comprising a bodyportion and a spur having a convex material engaging surface at itslower end formed between lateral surfaces of the spur.

3. As a new article of manufacture, a felting needle comprising asalient angled body portion provided with a spur having a convexmaterial engaging surface at its lower end formed between lateralsurfaces of the spur.

4. As a new article of manufacture, a felting needle comprising a bodyportion and a downwardly inclined spur having a convex and arcuatematerial engaging surface at its lower end formed between lateralsurfaces of the spur.

5. As a new article of manufacture a felting needle comprising a bodyportion, a recess in said body portion, a spur at said recess, saidrecess being defined by a bottom wall having a first portion thereofextending diagonally inwardly of said body portion and toward said spur,said bottom wall having second portions thereof lying laterally at thesides of said spur and together with said first portion defining athroat extending obliquely from said side walls of said spur around saidbody portion, and said bottom wall being of convex configurationtransversely of said body portion.

References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,326,038 8/1943Kapriva 284 2,349,086 5/ 1944 Foster 284 2,882,585 4/1959 Weickert 2843,224,067 12/1965 Foster 284 MERVIN STEIN, Primary Examiner.

L. K. RIMRODT, Assistant Examiner.

1. AS A NEW ARTICLE OF MANUFACTURE, A FELTING NEEDLE COMPRISING A BODYPORTION AND A SPUR HAVING A CONVEX MATERIAL ENGAGING SURFACE AT ITSLOWER END FORMED BETWEEN DOWNWARDLY CONVERGING LATERAL SURFACES OF THESPUR.